Hive Mind
by Mystery Melmoth
Summary: Naruto is not happy about how things played out, so he decides to send some of his knowledge back to his younger self. Unfortunately, he never defined exactly what he sent where. Now, a two years old Naruto runs around doing kage bunshin on instinct.
1. Intro

I don't own Naruto... seriously, nobody does, not even Kishimoto.

This is my first story, but in my head are some ideas for fanfics that are much older.

Please note that this is only a very short intro for this story and that the actual chapters, if I decide to write them, will be longer.

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><p>"Finally! It is done! Ten years... ten years are a long time. But a few hundred years... that is much, much longer, even if it is only in memory. Heh, when I think back, I never thought my first real jutsu would prove to be the most useful of them all? But enough about the past, for it is the past and thereby it is over! Choices have been made! People have died! Wars were lost!<p>

But, with _this_, my errors can be corrected and I can make things a little less... messy. I just hope my younger self won't get too arrogant with all the help I'm going to send over..."

And with that, a sixty year old Naruto sliced both his palms and smashed them down in the middle of the huge sealing array that covered the building.

When he started his project ten years ago, he had assumed that he would need a big seal for it.

It was, after all, breaking the fabric of time and space. But Naruto didn't think it would be quite that big, covering several floors and even reaching into the canalisation.

He also didn't think that it would drain so much chakra. Enough that he was kind of dying right now.

"Well... fuck."

Unheard last word can hardly be famous, so why try?

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><p>Naruto thought his plan was brilliant.<p>

It became quite obvious early on in his studies that he would never be able to go back, but sending something back seemed to be possible. The next ten years were devoted to finding a way of sending a bit of his knowledge and maybe his instincts back to his younger self.

Surprisingly, with the help of a lot of shadow clones, he was actually able to do it.  
>Unfortunately he never specified exactly what he sent exactly where...<p>

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><p>Uzumaki Naruto, currently two years old, opened his eyes and got out of his bed in the orphanage, when he realised that he didn't know the layout of the whole building.<p>

Naturally, he immediately created a sealless, smokeless and basically thoughtless shadow clone to scout the building.

He didn't even think about it.

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><p>As some may have guessed, this is an experiment and there is a chance that I will never upload more of it.<p> 


	2. Chapter 1

**I do not own Naruto. And neither do you. If, for some reason, you actually do own it, you might want to lock your door. **

**Wow, this is creepy.**

**I never thought I would get a response to my chapter so fast. That was really unexpected for me. **

**Might as well get on with it.**

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><p>It was during breakfast that Naruto suddenly twitched.<p>

Some of the other children gave him surprised looks, but upon seeing his blank stare they went back to eating.

Naruto continued to stare into nowhere, since he was very confused right now.

He remembered going to places in this orphanage where he wasn't allowed to and getting slapped by one of the guardians of the orphanage because he was somewhere he shouldn't be. That wasn't something new for him, but it baffled him that he didn't remember what he did after that. It was also strange that his cheek felt completely normal, while normally he would feel pain in his cheek for some time after getting slapped.

Maybe it had something to do with the headache he had since he woke up.

Having lost his appetite he decided to go back to sleep, since he was tired.

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><p><em>A nondescript guardian was currently walking towards Naruto's room, since he couldn't find the brat anywhere else. He was angry, unsettled and a bit scared. <em>His day had been completely fine, until a few minutes ago. His shift hadn't even started yet, when suddenly the door to the employee's room opened and the small figure of the demon brat had walked in, looking around in curiosity.

After the guardian had gotten over his brief shock, he had started shouting.

"What are you doing here! This room is off limits for children!"

But the brat had ignored him, walking deeper into the room while still looking around.  
>This made him even more angry. He, like most of Konoha, had lost some family in the kyuubi's attack two years ago, and he would have liked nothing better than to see the cursed child dead.<p>

Not being allowed to speak about the demon didn't make it better, so he stood up.

"Look at me brat! You better get out of here fast or I'll throw you out!"

The brat had still ignored him and proceeded to open a drawer that apparently caught his attention.

The guardian was now behind him and upon seeing what Naruto was doing, decided to slap the damned monster.

He didn't expect the small boy, who had fallen to the ground after getting slapped, to burst into smoke though.

_Now he stood there, in the once again empty room, trying to process what just happened. Unfortunately for Naruto, he wasn't a ninja and assumed he had been pranked by the kid. And he was not amused._

_Finally he was in front of the door to the demons room._

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><p>A loud noise roughly woke him up.<p>

"Get up, brat! And tell me what you've done! _Now!_"

Trying to blink away the sleep, he sat up in his bed. But before he could do anything else he was grabbed around the neck and lifted up. He reached up with his hands to pry himself loose, but he could do nothing against the strength of the adult holding him up. The only thing he could do was to look at his attacker fearfully.

"Still not talking, huh? I'll ask you once more, _why where you in the employ's room?_"

"W-what?"

"Not one hour ago! What did you do in the room? Why were you _sneaking_ around? Answer me!"

"D-don't know", he was crying by now, his neck hurt, he could hardly breathe and his head ached more than ever.

Seeing the kid degenerating into sobs and cries, the guardian sighed and tossed him back on his bed and proceeded to walk out of the room.

Just before he closed the door he turned to the still crying Naruto.

"You won't be sniffing around anymore today, demon. Maybe this will teach you a good lesson."

With that, he closed the door and locked it.

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><p>Naruto actually cried himself to sleep. When he woke up again it was already night.<p>

His head felt better now, but his confusion was greater than ever. He remembered... stuff, but it was all foggy and weird.

He knew one thing though, he needed to get out of this room, preferably without being seen.

Luckily, he had an actual window in his room, and while it was too high for his current body to reach, it would be no problem for an adult.

So he did the logical thing and transformed into the guardian from before. With a barely audible 'poof' and a bit of smoke he changed into the appearance of the adult, an easy task he had done countless times before, hadn't he?

After opening the window, he reminded himself that it would be bad if he suddenly disappeared and created a bunshin of himself before jumping out.

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><p>He had been very lucky.<p>

He had slept for so long that it was almost dawn, and many shops were already open.

After he had eaten a quick breakfast that he paid with some money he was able to steal from a bag, he was now wandering the streets of Konoha without a goal in mind. His thoughts were also a bit cleaner now.

He was Uzumaki Naruto.

He was two years old.

He knew... stuff.

That was the strange part. He knew things, but it felt like he should have known more. Walking through the city he realised that he was vaguely familiar with most things, but mostly in name. One shop he passed sold teriyaki, he knew that, but he didn't remember what teriyaki _was_.

He also noticed that those gaps in knowledge frustrated him to no end.

He knew that teriyaki was food, that much was obvious after he looked at the shop, but he didn't know why that food was called teriyaki.

This continued on and on as he walked through the streets, until he found himself in front of what he assumed was a library. Feeling that this would help him, he entered the building.

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><p>Books.<p>

So. Many. Books.

So much _knowledge._

In the middle of the library was standing one Uzumaki Naruto, currently disguised as a random civilian, with a dreamy expression that looked quite out of place on this serious adult's face. He then walked up to one bookshelf and grabbed the first book that seemed to be interesting and started to read.

Around him, several more civilians of varying ages and genders did the same.

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><p>Several weeks later:<p>

Naruto's life had changed a lot since that day. He only slept at the orphanage nowadays and created a bunshin after waking up. He spent much time in the libraries of Konoha and, after he acquired some more money, its bookshops. He found an unused shed in the industrial part of the city and used it to store the precious books.

Even after filling the gaps in his memory, he wasn't satisfied at all. He realised that he had very little understanding of interactions between people and the strange looks he got annoyed him.

So he begun spying on people.

He spied on people who were talking to each other.

He spied on people who were doing various jobs. How one hacked wood. How a woman bargained about clothes. How a barkeeper handled multiple customers. How a blacksmith worked. How two shinobi bought their equipment. About what four women chatted while drinking tea. How to brew tea.

And generally everything.

And after some time, the strange looks disappeared while he talked to people. And now most of them talked a lot more. He guessed it was because he didn't feel 'strange' to them anymore.

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><p><em>But it wasn't enough.<em>

* * *

><p>It was, of course, his young self that caused trouble.<p>

By falling out of his bed. And thereby going 'poof'.

Fortunately, he had another kagebushin in the vicinity of the orphanage at the time and was able to replace the lost _him _before something too bad happened.

But it made him realise the flaw in his current daily proceedings. A flaw that had to be fixed soon, because he had unfortunately drawn the attention of one female guardian who didn't absolutely hate him. She had noticed that he was often alone and barely ever took part in the activities that were taking place at the orphanage for the children.

She thought he was lonely and shy and went out of her way to include him in the daily activities. This lead to the young him having to make up a lot of excuses for why he couldn't play dodge ball with the other kids.

But he also couldn't have his actual body there, he needed it to do some basic work to earn a bit of cash so that he could buy more books. And food while he wasn't at the orphanage.

"Wait a second...", mused a brown haired girl which was eating in a restaurant. The young him always ate at the orphanage, he had to so he wouldn't raise any suspicions. But where did that food go? Every time he dispersed the bunshin left nothing behind unless one counted the smoke. The answer for that question was surprisingly easy to find.

He remembered it.

A kage bunshin was a construct of chakra that simulated a fully functional body. As it was created for reconnaissance, a kage bunshin had to be able to eat, but also to vanish without a trace. Therefore the kage bunshin's chakra literally destroyed all food that it consumed. That process actually shortened the duration of said bunshin as it consumed chakra for this task.

But that wasn't the point.

It had only served to remind him of something else he already knew.

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><p>Later that evening the girl sat in front of a pile of meat and bones that were stolen from a butchery with a wooden bowl filled with cold ramen on top. And to make things even stranger, all of it was covered in lines of blood. Her blood to be specific. Those lines connected everything in the pile and also led to a small circle in front of the pile.<p>

The girl took a deep breath and performed a series of handsigns before slamming her hands down on the small circle.

After a few minutes of nothing happening besides the blood glowing a bit, the pile suddenly imploded... while it exploded into smoke at the same time. Once the obligatory smoke cleared, the form of young Naruto could be seen once again, this time though, he was naked.

The girl giggled and blushed appropriately to the situation before handing him a set of clothes.

"What's so funny? I'm just another you after all."

"It's all about appearance, you know. I am a girl right now, so I act like a girl."

"Like I didn't know that already..."

"You're no fun, you know that?"

"I'm two years old! I should be unable to even know sarcasm! And here I am, _using it!_"

"Just get henge'd so you can go to the orphanage and replace yourself at the orphanage."

With that, young Naruto changed into the form of a nondescript civilian and left the shed.

It was a truly weird jutsu. It created a chakra construct not unlike a kage bunshin but connected it to an amount of existing matter, preferably something like flesh and bones, to give it a few advantages over a normal bunshin. It had, of course, some drawbacks.

It needed some supplies that were not always at hand in the field, for example. One could replace the bones and meat with something similar, but it always needed a bowl of ramen, and the bowl needed to be made out of something organic. Additionally it took a ton of chakra to make it work, so it was unavailable to most ninjas.

However, it was able to create a semi-stable construct that could take some hits before falling apart. And it was able to actually eat and use the food to _complete _ itself. While upon creation it was nothing more than lumps of flesh being held together with chakra, it could use the consumed food to replace the chakra with actual matter. It was a slow process, usually lasting several months, but the final product was a fully functional human body.

And the best part was that this body still had some properties of a kage bunshin.

When the new body created kage bunshin of itself, and these bunshins dispersed, all their knowledge was transferred to both bodies. And since a kage bunshin, upon creation, knew everything the original knew, once it dispersed, all that knowledge was transferred to the first body.

The girl chuckled once again to herself.

"Ramen bunshin no jutsu completed."

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><p><strong>And done!<strong>

**Even though it has been less then one day between the intro/teaser and this chapter, a lot has changed, since I now know where I want to go with this. the changes are:**

**Rating is now M.**

**Genre is now set to just Horror, but that might again change.**

**The rest were mostly changes of plans in my head.**

**Now I feel the need to address a few things.**

**Things old Naruto sent back are (including, but not limited to):**

**Kage bunshin no jutsu**

**A 'true' henge like it is used in many other fanfictions (easiest example should be Chunin Exam Day)**

**A thirst for knowledge (that comes from old Naruto spending many years on research) **

**Some other minor things, mostly what I would call Utility Everyday Knowledge.**

**Betaed  
><strong>


	3. Chapter 2

**None of me owns Naruto, why do you ask?**

**Beated**

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><p>Living two lives was... interesting. The young him didn't do much, he just kept a low profile back at the orphanage. It could have been worse.<p>

But the first one was very busy. He had about ten bunshins running around at all times. Any more would have been too suspicious.

But he was still driven towards amassing knowledge. And he was now doing something about this thirst.

One thing was given, he needed to get a clone out of the village. And without it being noticed, too. Staying unnoticed was already hard enough, seeing as he was at the moment disguised as somebody who didn't even exist and all his clones were doing the same. Using the identity of Naruto was a no-go, since he would not start going to the ninja academy for several years yet and should know absolutely nothing about ninjutsu, ergo he couldn't use any jutsu at the moment. This proved to be quite hard as he subconsciously wanted to do kage bunshin every time he came across something he wanted to know about, but didn't have the time to do it.

Soon another permanent clone was made and getting out of town was surprisingly easy. Disguise yourself as a travelling merchant, get up early, mingle in the crowd of travellers before the gates open, one rudimentary check up for documents that should not leave the walls and you were gone. Planned and executed in one day. It was kind of strange, as one would assume that the village would be more weary of enemy shinobi. If he'd had some intel in his head, nobody would have known.

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><p>Travelling with a large group turned out to be a boon and a curse at the same time. The large group made living on the streets much easier and helped to keep up his anonymity, but the longer they spent together the more they got acquainted with each other.<p>

It wasn't so bad for the first few days, but after some of the travellers had left the group, because they had different destinations, it became apparent that he could not stay with the first group until they reached the next big city.

If the group stayed the same size for several days, the people started talking to each other and got acquainted with each other. Which was very unfortunate for the clone, as he had no past. When he thought about it, he realized that this would be a major problem for them.

As he started to stand out for not telling others about him, not even giving them a name, he realised that he had to leave the protection the group supplied, because they started to give him strange looks again. Everyone of him hated strange looks.

They had always given him strange looks, no matter what he remembered, and even though he knew that he had only started to exploring the village about two months ago, the memories felt several years old.

He really didn't want to receive any more strange looks.

They reminded him of the kyuubi.

Oh, right.

The kyuubi.

_His bijuu._

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><p>Somewhere in Konoha, an unassuming looking girl nearly shrieked out loud with surprise.<p>

Quickly regaining her bearings, she whispered,

"The kyuubi! I had-? I had... forgotten?"

* * *

><p>"Hey."<p>

Little Naruto wasn't moving.

"Oi!"

He wasn't answering.

"I'm talking to you!"

Wasn't reacting. At all.

_"Idiot!"_

A slow nod.

"Wha-?"

"Finally! I though you were dead for a moment."

A brown-haired girl was standing before him with her hands on her hips. She was maybe a year older than him.

"What do you want?" He inquired.

"I just wanted to tell you that your soup is getting cold and that everyone else is nearly done. No need to be so angry!" She huffed and walked away.

After looking around and realising that, yes, everyone else in the orphanage was nearly done eating, he decided to leave as well. He had already lost his appetite.

He really hated this place.

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><p>The Traveller panted as he was resting in a small clearing in the woods of Hi no Kuni.<p>

After he realised that little fact about himself, he had panicked and more or less run away from the others. Some of him hoped that nobody would notice it, search for him or tell anyone in the next village about him.

That would not be good.

When he had found this little clearing, he made a quick bunshin to tell everyhim about his discovery.

Sitting down on the grass and resting his back against a tree, he tried to calm down and understand things. That is, until the city him decided to wait till the evening, so that they could think together via kage bunshins. Sounded reasonable. Of course it was reasonable... It was himself who had thought of it, after all.

"Right, it's me after all, not another person. Just another myself. I'm sure he wouldn't do anything unreasonable."

Of course he couldn't. After all, he was nothing more than a clone with a purpose. A replaceable clone, for his knowledge would be transferred to the others upon his death, so not even his demise would be a problem.

He knew that, but it wasn't a problem. He was only created to get them outside of Konoha, somewhere without so many shinobi crawling around.

Something he might as well do, before they decided about what to do with the kyuubi. But to accomplish this, he needed to get to another city. And he was deep in the woods at the moment, without any orientation, after running in mild panic for about one and a half hours.

Meaning he had no clue where to next city was.

"Well damn."

* * *

><p>Luckily, a chakra construct did not need to eat or drink, and did not get exhausted in the normal meaning of the word. And while he was not a mere chakra construct, shadow clones were exactly that.<p>

Which led to the fact the he had found a road with the help of one of his scout clones and was currently travelling along it. And it only took him three hours to find this one with the help of twenty bunshins. Meaning it had only been roughly eight hours since his last meal, and while he was not comfortable with that it did not pose any danger to him.

While he was walking along the road, hopefully away from Konoha and not towards it, the clone noticed that the sun was already quite low, meaning he should search for a place to endure the night. He had some basic camping equipment on him, but nothing like a tent or something similar.

What the clone, or the clones in general did not know was the fact that they shared the same luck as their original. And this luck manifested itself after another two hours in form of some lights at the horizon, which prompted the travelling clone to not stop and search for a spot to sleep, but to continue walking in hope of getting to the city before nightfall.

When he received an influx of memory about a mile before entering the city, the clone was surprised quite a bit, since it wasn't totally dark yet for him, but the memory showed him the black sky over Konoha. It seemed that he had travelled farther then he had anticipated as his was definitely not some small town in the vicinity of Konoha.

The shared information calmed his mind though, since apparently things were a lot less complex than he imagined.

First, only the Naruto original had a seal on his stomach when channelling chakra. After checking himself, the clone confirmed this and was glad of it. Accidentally splitting the fox chakra into several portions and bodies would not be a good thing. While maybe not apocalyptic it would have made things much more annoying. And since they all had the feeling that possessing the kyuubi was somehow a danger for the person in question, they decided that it should remain in the most secure environment, which would be the orphanage of Konoha.

Secondly, knowledge over his tenant explained a lot of things the city clone had heard from the civilians, and provided a reason for the distaste the guardians at the orphanage had for him.

They panicked a bit when they remembered some civilians ranting about the demon having taken him over, but they decided that they did not feel possessed, and before more evidence showed itself about the fox taking over, he would disregard it as some mad raving of a drunken man.

While strolling through the gates of the city, the clone decided that is was pretty meaningless for him, the kyuubi would be the problem of the other hims.

His problem was getting a place to stay. It should not provide that much of a problem, as he had some money for food and stuff for several days, but a place to spend that money was still required.

Once again, his luck led him to an inn in the city core.

After getting a room for the night, he decided to get some food at the bar on the first floor. This proved to be a far better decision than could have imagined, as he overheard a very interesting conversation between two merchants.

"Have you heard? The iron imports are going to be more expensive, since those samurai want to hinder the growth of the shinobi forces. But the thing is, that was apparently decided weeks ago. I only heard about it from a caravan this morning."

"Again? Man what a pain, I gave out a large order for steel just yesterday, and now the prices need to be adjusted all over! I would pay for faster information."  
>"What about the messenger birds?"<br>"Do you know how much they cost? And how many I would need to get all the info I need? I ship goods all over the elemental nations, for god's sake, I would need one bird for every major decision with an impact on trading from all those countries! And even then some news would take a few days to arrive. And the fucking paperwork is not helping at all. Do you know how annoying it is to receive news from your caravans that some daimyo or another suddenly decided to double the fines for passing the border?"

The other merchant gave his friend an understanding look.

"Yeah, I know. We traders all know. It's annoying as hell. But what can we do about it?", he sighed. "Let's just get another drink, and hope it still costs as much as the first ones."

They were right, they couldn't do anything about it. But a certain unassuming individual just got a great idea.

Information trading. He could totally do that. He just needed to get a clone or two in every major city, then he would be able to get news and rumours around in an instant. And then he could charge the people for it.

And of course, it provided the perfect opportunity for him to gain more knowledge. If he did it right, some clones might even become apprentices in the right places to get insider knowledge.

This night, three apparently totally unrelated people were unable to sleep because they were far too excited.

They did not know it, but this night the Bristling Leaves were born.

* * *

><p><em>A few months later:<em>

Hearing the sound of his door opening, the businessman looked up from a scroll.

"Hello, what can I do for you?" He asked automatically, showing that he had said this sentence far too often already, since he finished speaking even before his guest even stepped into view.

It looked like a traveller, since this otherwise uninteresting guy wore some really good boots which looked like they were used a lot.

"You are buying rice from Kusa, aren't you?" The traveller asked.

"Yes I do, why do you ask? You don't really look like a buyer to me." Correction, he didn't look like someone who was worth his time.

"Actually, I want to sell you something."

"And what would that be?" The businessmen was getting annoyed. What a waste of time.

"Hmm, say, have you heard news from Kusa lately?"

"You mean those local uproars? That's old news. Now what do you want?"

"No, no, no. I have more recent news, news that could cost you a lot of money."

"And I guess you want money for telling me? How do I know you're not making whatever news you have up?

"Do I really look so untrustworthy? But anyways, I don't even want much money for this. But you understand that I need to be paid before telling you, don't you?"

"Of course... Okay, I want those news. How much?"

He raised an eyebrow after hearing the amount.

"Well that really isn't that much. I think I actually have the right amount on me right now." He searched his pockets for a moment before paying.

"Now tell, time is money and stuffs, you know."

"Thanks. So... Well, it's good you know about those local uproars already, that makes things easier. Because those uproars got out of hand, the government decided to do something about it and sent some shinobi to settle things. And they settled it brutally. But the important thing is this. Apparently, those rebels managed to get the help of some missing nin, and before anyone knew it, those guys started throwing those explosive notes or whatever around! Took the shinobi three days to get all those guys, and now a huge chunk of the rice fields in the east of the country are more or less craters. The farmers say two thirds of the harvest is ruined."

The businessman paled. That was the region he normally bought his rice from. That was a disaster.

"When did that happen? Such news travel fast in the trading community"

The man grinned.

"Last night."

"What! How could you know this? Do you know how long news from Kusa need till they arrive here in **Kaminari no Kuni (Land of Lightning)**? This is ridiculous! Where did you hear this?"

"That. Is my problem. But let me assure you that this information is valid." The man turned around and walked towards the door.

"I hope it helps you."

"Wait! If this is really genuine... If this actually happened just last night, then it would be a huge favour for me if nobody else knows of this yet. Let's say I give you thrice the original sum, would you keep quiet about this?"

To his surprise, the man started to laugh.

"Hahahahaha, do you really think I work alone?"

The businessman winced. Of course! This man had to be a member of some part of group to know something like this so fast and that meant that this group wanted to sell this information to many different merchants, and therefore would lose quite a bit of cash if they didn't sell this to anyone else.

"Two days."

The man from Kaminari looked up in surprise.

"If you give me thrice the original amount, we won't give this information to anyone else for today, tomorrow and the day after that. But you better get the best alternative deals till then, because after that this information is once again available for everyone with enough cash."

"Okay! That's better than nothing, I should be able to get some good deals before that."

The messenger turned around again.

"One more thing please!"

"Yes?"

"How can I contact your group?"

"You know that pub with the blue walls? Go there around 9:45 pm and buy some of the local sake. Someone will recognize you."

"How do I know its one of your group?"

"He will give you a piece of paper with a number on it. The number will be the same as what you paid me before it got tripled. Got it?"

"Yes, thank you. You gave me a good opportunity."

The man vanished through the door.

And was never seen again. Well, at least not in that form.

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><p><strong>Final-fucking-ly!<strong>

**Damn this took longer than I thought it would... some of this chapter has been laying around for over a month.**

**So anyways... Next chapter should be the last before we get to events of the canon, and it will be told from many different perspectives. And if I am lucky, I might get to introduce the horror that SHOULD be part of this sooner or later. Whatever. **


End file.
